| Caucasian Albania |
Article Index for Caucasian |
Shopping Caucasian |
Website Links For Caucasian |
Information AboutCaucasian Albania |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT CAUCASIAN ALBANIA | |
| caucasus | |
| former countries in europe | |
| history of azerbaijan | |
| history of armenia | |
| nagorno-karabakh | |
|
Caucasian Albania, also known as '''Alvank''' in , was an ancient kingdom, which existed on the territory of present-day Republic Of Azerbaijan and southern Dagestan . The name "Albania" is Latin , and denotes "mountainous land".James Stuart Olson. An Ethnohistorical Dictionary of the Russian and Soviet Empires. ISBN 0313274975 The native name for the country is unknown.Robert H. Hewsen. Ethno-History and the Armenian Influence upon the Caucasian Albanians, in: Samuelian, Thomas J. (Hg.), Classical Armenian Culture. Influences and Creativity, Chico: 1982, 27-40. ANCIENT POPULATION OF CAUCASIAN ALBANIA Caucasian Albanians were one of the Ibero-Caucasian Peoples , the ancient and indigenous population of modern southern Dagestan and Azerbaijan. Strabo wrote about the Caucasian Albanians in the 1st century BC: The Mannaeans had one of the earliest states recorded as being established in the area as far as the Kura from ca. 800 BC , and they were rivals of Urartu and Assyria , but later fell under the rule of Urartu until their destruction and eventual assimilation by the Medes under Cyaxares in 616 BC . In ancient times, they were heavily mixed with the Persian people who settled in the area during the Achaemenid , Parthia n and Sassanid periods. CITIES AND REGIONS Strabo had no knowledge of any city in Albania, although in the 1st century AD Pliny mentions the initial capital of the kingdom which was pronounced in many different ways including Kabalaka, Shabala, Tabala, and present-day Qabala . Later the capital moved to the south to Partaw (present-day Barda ). EARLY HISTORY According to the Georgia n chronicle “Juansher's Concise History of the Georgians”, Armenians, Georgians and Albanians had one father named Togarmah (Torgom), who was descendant of Japheth , son of Noah . Torgom divided his land among his sons, and gave to one of them, by the name of Bartos, the "territory from the Berdahoj river to the region of the Kur river to the sea where the conjoined Erasx ( Aras ) and Kur rivers enter it". According to this legend, Bartos built the city Partaw in his own name. Juansher's Concise History of the Georgians According to the local tradition, Aran was a legendary ancestor and the eponym of the Albanians. Thus, referring to the events in the beginning of 2nd C. BC , he mentions that "… as leader of tribes to the north , by king Vagharshak's order, was appointed someone from the family of Sisakan , one of the descendants of Yafet , named Aran , who inherited the plains and mountains of the country of Aghvank beginning from the river Yeraskh ( Araks ) up to the castle of Hnarakert (on river Kura )," after whom "this country was called Aghvank" (I.4). Medieval historian Moses Of Kalankatuyk explained the name Alvank as a derivation from the word ''Alu'' which was the nickname of Caucasian Albania's first king Aran and referred to his lenient personality.''The History of Aluank'' by Moses of Kalankatuyk. Book I, chapter IV The Armenian historian Moses Of Chorene , who is considered in Armenian historiography "the father of Armenian history", also confirmed that the Sisakan family inherited the area "from the river Yeraskh ( Araks ) up to the castle called Hnarakert ," and the region was named Aghvank after them in the early 2nd Century BC (History of Armenia, II.8). However it is uncertain whether Aran and Sisak were real or imaginary persons.J. H. Kramers. The Military Colonization of the Caucasus and Armenia under the Sassanids. Bulletin of the School of Oriental Studies, University of London, Vol. 8, No. 2/3. The kingdom of Caucasian Albania (Aghbania, Aghvania) was founded in the late 4th - early 3rd Century BC . Albanians are mentioned for the first time in 331 BC at the Battle Of Gaugamela as participants from the satrapy of Media. Encyclopedia Iranica. M. L. Chaumont. Albania. Parts of Caucasian Albania, including Utik on the right bank of the Kura river were conquered by the Armenia ns, in the 1st century B.C. The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. Nagorno-Karabakh Strabo , Ptolemy and Pliny all write that at this time, the border between Albania and the Kingdom of Greater Armenia was through the river Kura . At the same time Strabo writes that the river of Kura flows through Albania. However the frontier along the Kura was repeatedly overrun, to the advantage sometimes of the Albanians, sometimes of the Armenians. In 66 BC , following the defeat of the Armenian king Tigranes II at the hand of the Romans , the Armenian empire lost most of its territory. At this time, the Albanians regained control over their right bank territories conquered by Armenians. According to the 7th c. historian Moses of Kalankatuyk, author of "History of Aghvank", at this time, the southern border of Caucasian Albania was along the Araks river.Russia and Azerbaijan: a borderland in transition - T Swietochowski
Between 83 and 93 A.D. in the reign of Domitian a detachment of the Legio XII Fulminata was sent to the Caucasus to support the allied kingdoms of Iberia and Albania in a war against Parthia . An inscription found in Gobustan (69 km south of Baku ) attests to the presence of a Roman garrison in that area. During the reign of Roman emperor Hadrian (117-138) Albania was invaded by the Alans , an Iranian nomadic group. Encyclopaedia Britannica 1911 THE SASANIAN DOMINATION See Also: Albania (satrapy) In 252-253 AD Caucasian Albania along with , the Albanian king had only a semblance of authority, and the Sassanid Marzban (military governor) held most civil, religious, and military authority. In the middle of the 4th century the king of Albania Urnayr arrived in Armenia and was baptized by Gregory The Illuminator , but Christianity spread in Albania only gradually, and the Albanian king remained loyal to the Sassanids. After the partition of Armenia between Byzantium and Persia (in 387 AD ), Albania, as an ally of Sassanid Persia, regained all the right bank of the river Kura up to river Araxes, including Artsakh and Utik. Sasanian king Yazdegerd II passed an edict requiring all the Christians in his empire to convert to Mazdaism , fearing that Christians might ally with Roman Empire, which had recently adopted Christianity. This led to rebellion of Albanians, along with Armenians and Iberians. In a battle that took place in 451 AD In The Avarayr Field , the allied forces of the Armenian, Albanian and Iberian kings, devoted to Christianity, suffered defeat at the hands of the Sassanid army. Many of the Albanian nobility ran to the mountainous regions of Albania, particularly to Artsakh, that became a center for resistance to Sassanid Iran. The religious center of the Albanian state also moved here. However, the Albanian king Vache, a relative of Yazdegerd II, converted to the official religion of the Sasanian empire, but soon reverted back to Christianity. In the middle of the 5th century by the order of the Persian king Peroz I Vache built in Utik the city initially called Perozabad, and later Partaw and Barda , and made it the capital of Albania. Movses Kalankatuatsi. History of Albania. Book 1, Chapter XV Partaw was the seat of the Albanian kings and Persian marzban, and in 552 A.D. the seat of the Albanian Catholicos was also transferred to Partaw. Movses Kalankatuatsi. History of Albania. Book 2, Chapter VI After the death of Vache, Albania remained without a king for thirty years. The Sasanian Balash reestablished the Albanian monarchy by making Vachagan, son of Yazdegerd and brother of the previous king Vache, the king of Albania. By the end of the 5th century, the ancient Arsacid royal house of Albania, a branch of the ruling dynasty of Parthia , became extinct, and in the 6th century it was replaced by princes of the Persian or Parthian Mihranid family, who claimed descent from the Sasanians. They assumed a Persian title of Arranshahs (i.e. Shah s of Arran, Persian name of Albania). Encyclopedia Iranica. C. E. Bosworth. Arran The ruling dynasty was named after its Persian founder Mihran, who was a distant relative of the Sasanians. Moses Kalankatuatsi. History of country of Aluank. Chapter XVII. About the tribe of Mihran, hailing from the family of Khosrow the Sasanian, who became the ruler of the country of Aluank Mihranid dynasty survived under Muslim suzerainty until 821-2.The Cambridge history of Iran. 1991. ISBN 0521200938 In the late 6th – early 7th centuries AD the territory of Albania became an arena of wars between Sasanian Persia, 2006 ), p. 385–386. while Vladimir Minorsky stated that, in Islamic times, "the town of Qabala lying between Sharvan and Shakki was a place where Khazars were probably settled".V. Minorsky. Caucasica IV. Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Vol. 15, No. 3. (1953), pp. 504-529. ARAB AND SELJUK DOMINATION In the middle of the 7th Century AD , the kingdom was overrun by the Arabs and, like all Islamic conquests at the time, incorporated into the Caliphate . The Albanian king Javanshir , the most prominent ruler of Mihranid dynasty, fought against the Arab invasion of Caliph Uthman on the side of the Sasanid Iran . Facing the threat of the Arab invasion on the south and the Khazar offensive on the north, Javanshir had to recognize the Caliph’s suzerainty. The Arabs then reunited the territory with Armenia under one governor. From the s, the Principality of Shirvan , the Principality of Derbent , etc. Most of the region was ruled by the Sajid Dynasty of Azerbaijan from 890 to 929. As a result of the expansion of Seljuks Turks into the territory of modern Azerbaijan in the 11th Century , the indigenous Albanian population was assimilated. Albanians played a significant role in the Ethnogenesis of today's Azeris . RELIGION The ancient , Zeus , and Luna . Caucasian Albania was one of the first countries where Christianity was adopted in the 4th Century , and the first Christian church in the region was built by St. Eliseus, a disciple of Thaddeus Of Edessa , in a place called Gis (believed to be the modern-day Church Of Kish ). In 498 AD (in other sources, 488 AD) in the settlement named Aluen (Aguen) (present day Agdam region of Azerbaijan), an Albanian church council convened to adopt laws further strengthening the position of Christianity in Albania. Albanian churchmen took part in missionary efforts in the Caucasus and Pontic regions. In 682, the Catholicos Israel led an unsuccessful delegation to convert Alp Iluetuer , the ruler of the North Caucasian Huns , to Christianity. The Albanian Church maintained a number of monasteries in the Holy Land . Movses Kalankatuatsi. History of Albania. Book 2, Chapter LII The Arabic conquest resulted in gradual Islamization of the Albanian population. ALPHABET AND LANGUAGE See Also: Caucasian Albanian alphabet ]] According to Movses Kaghankatvatzi , the Albanian Alphabet was invented by Mesrob Mashdots , an Armenian Monk , Theologian and Linguist (see Moses Kalankaytuk, ''The History of Aluank'', I, 27 and III, 24). Another Armenian historian, Koriun , in his book ''"The Life of Mashtots"'', wrote: ''"Then there came and visited them an elderly man, an Albanian named Benjamin. And he inquired and examined the barbaric diction of the Albanian language, and then through his usual God-given keenness of mind invented an alphabet, which he, through the grace of Christ, successfully organized and put in order."'' (see [http://www.vehi.net/istoriya/armenia/korun/english/03.html Koriun, Ch. 16 ). The Albanian alphabet was rediscovered by a Georgian scholar, Professor Ilia Abuladze , in 1937 . The alphabet was found in Matenadaran MS No. 7117, an Armenian-language manual of the 15th Century . This manual presents different alphabets for comparison: Armenian, Greek, Latin, Syrian, Georgian, Coptic, and Albanian among them. The Albanian alphabet was titled: ''"Aluanic girn e"'' (Albanic letters). Abuladze made an assumption that this alphabet was based on Georgian letters. No text in Caucasian Albanian has survived, hence any attempt to link ancient Albania with modern Azerbaijan must remain pure speculation, though these speculations payed an important part in the Azerbaijani nation building process from the 1960s onward.Ethnicity and Ethnic Conflict in the Post-Communist World By Ben Fowkers - Page 30 The distinctive Albanian speech persisted into early Islamic times, and Arabic geographers recorded that the language which they called Arranian was still spoken in the capital Barda in the 10th century. The Udi Language , spoken by 8000 people mostly in Azerbaijan, and also Georgia, is thought to be the last remnant of the language once spoken in Caucasian Albania. Caucasian Albanian Script. The Significance of Decipherment by Dr. Zaza Alexidze. FOOTNOTES For a specimen of the 'Caucasian Albanian Palimpsest' see Wolfgang Schulze http://www.lrz-muenchen.de/~wschulze/Cauc_alb.htm SEE ALSO EXTERNAL LINKS
REFERENCES
|
|
|